


Compensation

by Lassarina



Category: Final Fantasy XII
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-07-24
Updated: 2009-07-24
Packaged: 2017-10-30 14:50:39
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 679
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/332932
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lassarina/pseuds/Lassarina
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Value isn't only in metal and gems.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Compensation

**Author's Note:**

> Takes place post- _Shiva._ Spawned because I started thinking about Balthier's motives for making that specific request--both the ones he admits to, and the ones he doesn't.

"Compensation--is that what you want?" She faces him, full of fierce hope and fiercer determination, her request more of a demand as she offers a fee for his services.

It will be a long time before he gets paid if he takes this job, and to be honest it looks to be more hassle than it is worth.

Yet he senses the threads of greatness, of legend, spinning close around her, and the gratitude of a queen is no mere trinket.

He knows the role, draws it closer around him like a favourite vest. "Straight to the point, aren't we. I like that. Compensation?" He is all set to make some outrageous demand, something that will cripple the royal treasury and outrage her, if only because she is entertaining when roused to rage, but he catches a glimpse of the ring she twists round her finger, and what he says instead is "How about the ring."

"This?" She looks down at it, closes her fingers tight as though to assure herself that it yet rests on her fingers. "Isn't there something else?" There's a hint of desperation in her voice, for all that she tries to pass it off as puzzlement.

"No one's forcing you." He knows precisely what effect those words will have on her—the princess ill resists a dare or challenge, something she would do well to tame ere taking her throne.

She grits her teeth and pulls it off, her fingers lingering on it as she hands it over. He spies the poesy inscribed on the inner curve— _Thy heart I guard as mine own_ —and barely keeps his smirk from transforming into a triumphant grin. Small wonder she was so unwilling to part with this.

"I'll give it back to you," he promises her blithely. He cannot resist the additional dig, "As soon as I find something more valuable."

She sneers and storms out the door. The boy looks at him, puzzled. "What do you mean, something more valuable?" he asks.

"Hard to say," he drawls. "I'll know it when I find it. What is it you want, Vaan? What are you looking for?" He calls the question behind him as he departs the tiny room, fraught now with the tensions of their deal.

Fran strides ahead of him to the market, her ears flicking rapidly. He hurries his stride to draw abreast of her. "What?" he asks her, with some annoyance.

"You choose an interesting leash," she says, and beneath her words he reads a blend of censure and approval.

"Well, she's not like to refuse to pay when I hold her wedding ring, is she?" he retorts.

"It is tactically sound," is all that Fran says in reply.

"What would you have me do, Fran?" he says in some exasperation.

She pauses at the entrance to the bazaar and looks back at him, and he remembers suddenly that she is much, much older than he. "Only be honest with yourself why you choose that as your goad," she says, and then vanishes into the press of the bodies in the bazaar. Amazing how such a tall woman—and with such prominent ears—can disappear when she chooses.

Balthier huffs out a sigh and leans against a convenient pillar. The reasons he'd given Fran were truthful, as far as they went. The princess cherishes this ring, and several times he'd caught her running her finger over it as though to remind herself of something—or someone.

And yet Fran is right; the obvious and logical reasons have less to do with his irrational urge to get the prince's ring off her finger. Balthier turns the circle of silver idly in his fingertips, watching sunlight glint off the inscribed poesy, and grins wryly to himself. Well, he has done more foolish things by far than flirt with princesses—deposed or no—and besides, this is just the sort of thing that a leading man should be doing.

He slips the ring in his pocket and heads into the bazaar in search of Fran.


End file.
